Christine Valters Paintner's Blog, page 82

Monk in the World Guest Post: Emily Wilmer

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Emily Wilmer's reflection, "The Dance: Spirit, Prayer and Laughter."

We skipped church this morning. We skipped for two reasons. It’s Trinity Sunday, and as much as I appreciate the clergy staff at our church, I couldn’t bear the thought of one more Sunday when someone tried to explain the Trinity. The other reason is that yesterday I spent 6 hours in the yard digging up a new garden area, amending the soil, planting flowers and spreading mulch. My body is tired and sore, but that good kind of sore; a grateful sore that I can still do it.

So this morning I got my slow moving body out of bed, had a slow moving breakfast with strong Welsh tea with David, and heard a few words of wisdom from the early Christian desert father, Abba Moses the Robber. We then went down to our lovely oratory for our morning contemplative prayer.

This is a space that we remodeled into a place specifically for prayer and nothing else. This little oratory is set aside only for listening for the Mystery we call God. We are surrounded by rich and colorful icons of the life of Christ and oil lamps that bring a soft glow to everything in the room; including us. It is a room of Presence and energy in which we place ourselves with the continuing desire to know Jesus, the Risen Christ. We pray that our mind, heart and bones are soaked with the renewing light and love of the Christ.

So this morning we each took our turn at the threshold, bowing in reverence before stepping across to take our place. We each sat down, took up our shawl or prayer beads and prepared for the sound of the meditation bell and the opening chant to follow. David struck the wooden bell to call us to attention. He then struck the large bronze meditation bell to signal our entry into silence. He’s had a cold for three days now and finds it hard to chant because of the congestion in nose and throat but thought he would try again this morning. He began the opening chant . . . but stopped after the first three words.

“You’ll have to do the chant. I can’t chant and breathe at the same time – even for God”

He chuckled but I laughed out loud . . . and I continued laughing. He caught my laughter and it grew and grew until the room was saturated with laughter. We couldn’t stop; it kept growing no matter how we tried to stifle it or mute it or stop it. The laughter just kept growing until I finally took a deep breath and said, “Okay, okay, I’m stopping now" . . . and then started laughing again. I was laughing so hard I was crying and my stomach muscles were beginning to hurt. It was WONDERFUL!

As G. K. Chesterton said: “Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly."

We did finally settle down and enter into the silence but silence enriched with our laughter. Half way through our sitting time, my eyes fell on the Rubelev icon of the Trinity – the three persons sitting at table. Perichoresis is a word often used to describe the energetic dynamic of the Trinity. It is from two Greek words, peri meaning ‘around’ and choresis meaning ‘dance’ or dancing’. When you put them together you have ‘dancing in relation to another’. I love that: a dance of the energies of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

As our time of meditation and prayer was coming to a close; a thought swept into my mind:

If anyone wants to know what the dance of the Trinity sounds like, all they need do is experience prayerful laughter! Spirit, prayer and laughter all dancing around together right here in our little oratory in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

I wonder:

When have you been surprised by the convergence of laughter and prayer?

When have you experienced the Spirit running wild in unexpected places?

Might the Holy One be delighted when our laughter breaks into our intense focus and reflection . . . and gives not only us, but God, a brief moment of pure merriment?

Emily Wilmer is a spiritual director, retreat leader, poet and co-director of Oasis of Wisdom: Institute for Contemplative Study, Practice and Living in Asheville, NC. At this time in her life spiritual direction happens in meaningful conversations over tea and a scone; poetry has become her prayer . . . and vice versa.

8 Practices of a Good Pilgrimage ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims,

The value of travel was ingrained in me from a young age. When I was growing up in New York City my father worked for the United Nations, and we had the privilege of traveling back to Austria, where he was from, as well as other European countries and once as a teen through Asia.

As an adult I began to see the potential for deeper meaning in my journeys. I saw a difference between travel as a tourist and making a journey as a pilgrim. I often define pilgrimage as courting holy disruption. We go on a soulful, intentional journey to break ourselves open in new ways. As tourists we want everything to go according to plan.

Pilgrims welcome the opportunity for changing course and perspective along the way. Pilgrimage is an inner journey in response to outer movement. Sometimes the journey doesn’t involve any physical relocation. We might embark on pilgrimage because of illness or transition in our lives and find that we are moving into new internal territory. The old structures no longer hold. This is the practice of hearing the call—whether it was a call we desired or it came unbidden. When we respond and say yes to the journey, it takes us on, and then we become pilgrims. When life beckons we can resist at every turn, or we can recognize that things are changing and our invitation is to open ourselves.

The journey calls us to pack lightly. We discover that the old ways, habits, and patterns no longer serve us. Perhaps we feel an impulse to simplify our lives so that we have more room and resources for the new that is emerging. Travel is easier with light bags. We ask ourselves: What do we want to carry forward?

We then cross a threshold, which is a space between. The old has fallen away and the new hasn’t yet emerged. Thresholds are sacred places in the Celtic imagination where the veil between heaven and earth is considered thin. When we open ourselves to the liminal and stop grasping at the way things were, we may discover a variety of unseen presences supporting us along the way.

Embarking on pilgrimage may tempt us to seek the well-worn path, but the essence of the true inner journey is finding our own way forward. The poet Antonio Machado says that “the way is made by walking.” We put one foot in front of the other and the next step is revealed only as we are in movement. This demands a great deal of trust and listening for the whispers of the divine along the way.

The Latin root of the word pilgrim is peregrini, which means “stranger.” We go on pilgrimage to become strangers to all that is familiar, to break out of our routine vision of the world and discover something new. This requires that we stretch, travel to wild edges, and risk being uncomfortable. It is in that discomfort that we encounter new dimensions of our own capacity and new faces of the sacred.

Along the way we will encounter our own limitations again and again. We will find ourselves resisting or forgetting our spiritual practice. In the monastic tradition there is great value placed on “beginner’s mind” and the honoring of our humanity. When we stray too far from our own deep desires of the heart, we are issued an invitation to always begin again.

Ultimately the pilgrimage journey asks us to embrace mystery, to walk into unknowing, to relinquish our grasp on certainty and control. In that process we allow ourselves to be broken open to receive gifts far bigger than our own limited imaginations could ponder.

And finally the journey always calls us back home again with renewed awareness. Even if we never left home physically on pilgrimage but made the deep inner journey, we discover that home is a deep, abiding presence within us and see the familiar in new ways. We return with the gifts that we were offered along the path.

These eight practices are all part of an inner pilgrimage of discovery, where we may not even travel past our own neighborhood. But by seeing our experience with new eyes we can find ourselves and God in new ways.

Pilgrimage is an ancient call and practice. Any time we approach life in this way, we join with the millions before us who have felt drawn to wander and see life through a new lens and to trust in the unknown. We can open ourselves up to God’s work through our inner and outer journeys in the everyday. No plane tickets required.

(This article also appears in the July 2018 issue of U.S. Catholic (Vol. 83, No. 7, pages 12–17) as well as on their website.)

Please join us for our Lenten online retreat as we journey through my book The Soul of a Pilgrim together in community.

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Photo © Christine Valters Paintner

Monk in the World Guest Post: Kathleen Schwab

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Kathleen Schwab's reflection, "Love God Like a Falcon."

On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night.

(Psalm 63:6 NIV)

The relationship between God and a human being is unique, and describing it or making analogies can be tricky. After all, it is essentially unlike any other relationship we have with anyone or anything else. Over the last few years, I’ve found something that unexpectedly offers some insights into the human/God relationship: I’ve been studying birds of prey, and the falconers who work with them.

A process called “manning,” used in training hunting falcons, presents some intriguing parallels to the Christian life. Manning builds the bond between the human and avian partners, and makes them a strong team in the field. This type of training is available to us in our Christian lives too: I think of it as “God-ing.” It is something that God offers us at any time, and it will make us far more effective in finding our way through the unpredictable challenges of life.

To understand this analogy, you first have to understand what a unique relationship people have with their trained birds of prey. The issue is the falcons’ freedom: they can fly away if they want, go live on their own in the wild. While hunting, falcons climb hundreds of feet in the air: with the human earth-bound far below, the birds cannot be forced to return. Falconers win their birds over by demonstrating a human partner’s value, making landing yet again on the falconer’s glove the most attractive option.

To prove his or her value, a falconer takes the bird to a good spot, sends it high in the air, and then flushes out some game from the surrounding bushes. While the trained falcon gets lots of prey sent into range, the solitary falcon may have to wait patiently for hours until one animal happens to be in the right place. Most falcons quickly realize how much better life is with a human hunting partner, and choose to return again and again.

A trained falcon is an amazing thing: a wild creature that develops a working partnership with a human, yet retains its wild nature.

Here is where manning comes in as a part of the training regimen. Manning means falcons spending time with humans while not hunting. Falconers may do some manning on a rainy day when flying isn’t possible: the falcon spends the day in the house among people, sitting quietly on an arm while the human works on the computer, does chores, or watches T.V. The bird gets the chance to observe the ways of its flightless hunting partner on an ordinary day. Manning can look like nothing much is going on, but if done regularly, both falcon and falconer will have a much better sense of how to read each other’s body language, and how to respond quickly to each other’s signals. Manning builds both understanding and trust.

God-ing is spending time with God outside of church attendance and structured devotions: it means continuing attention towards God while we live regular life. “Remain in me, as I also remain in you.” (John 15: 4) God's attention does not leave us, although God has given us the freedom to ignore it. But if we spend time simply paying attention to God, to how God operates in our lives, if we study God as a mystery worth knowing, we will reap the rewards of a relationship like no other.

Like falcons, human beings have amazing freedom. God made us, but we can fly away from God, and choose to live life on our own. “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:45 NIV) We are not forced to believe in God in order to survive, or to have access to all the good things in the world. But if we decide to live under God's guidance, so much more will be available to us. God can direct us: God can help us to do more than we could ever hope to do alone.

But as for me, the nearness of God is my good. (Psalm 73:28)

Kathleen Schwab is a lifelong lover of God, a literature teacher, and a wife and mother. Together with her book partner Therese Kay, she is the author of Messages from God: An Illuminated Devotional, a five week devotional inspired by the synergy of words and art in medieval illuminated manuscripts. Visit her online at MessagesFromGodDevotional.com

The Sacred Gifts of Poetry ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dreaming of Stones

In the world before waking

I meet a winged one,

feathered, untethered,

who presses in my palm

three precious stones,

like St. Ita in her dream,

but similarities end there,

her with saintliness and certainty,

me asking questions in the dark.

All I know is

I am not crafted from

patience of rock or gravity of earth,

nor flow of river,

I am not otter with

her hours devoted to play.

I am none of these.

At least not yet.

The stones will still be singing

centuries from now,

made smooth by

all kinds of weather.

If I strike them together,

they spark and kindle.

Do I store them as treasures

to secretly admire

on storm-soaked days?

Or wear them as an amulet

around my neck?

When the angel returns to me

in the harsh truth of last morning,

will she ask

what have I endured,

treasured, and sparked?

Will she ask what have I hidden away

and what made visible?

—Christine Valters Paintner (first published in Spiritus journal)

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims,

Each year, John and I lead a weeklong writing retreat on the sacred and magical island of Inismor, off the coast of Connemara in the west of Ireland. We have led this retreat several times and there is something so special about extended time on this small limestone outcropping in the Atlantic Ocean that has been a place for pilgrimage for hundreds of years. We gather together in the mornings for shared ritual and song, lectio divina, and writing practice. We write for the love of it, we write to generate new ideas, we write to discover what we know, and we experiment with some different forms to see what happens when we stretch out of old patterns.

I have always considered myself a writer, first and foremost, since I was a fairly young girl. Perhaps being an only child and an introvert who loved books, drew me into the dance of words and the space between them, and how they can dazzle me into new knowing. I was fortunate to take on a journaling practice in my twenties, inspired by Julia Cameron’s lovely book The Artist’s Way. I was deeply inspired by the illuminated manuscripts and the monks who lovingly and painstakingly copied those words with their beautiful embellishments. I wanted so much to live a creative life in the midst of the work I was called to do in teaching, retreat facilitation, and spiritual direction.

The balance hasn’t always been easy. I went on to graduate school, mostly because I wanted to immerse myself in words and writing, and my hope was that the PhD program would somehow cultivate my writing skills. It did shape me into an academic writer for a long time, and it did give me important tools of scholarship and research which I still draw on far outside the walls of academia.

After finishing my doctoral studies, I was drawn to start writing a blog. Blogging was fairly new then, this was twelve years ago. It forced me to write more succinctly and for a much wider audience than my academic training had encouraged. And of course, that blog became Abbey of the Arts, which in turn became a global community. I am still in awe of how things unfold.

It is a tremendous privilege that I am able to write and publish books that feel meaningful to me and others. I still struggle at times with the “balance” between my own creative work and my time spent teaching and facilitating others, another passion of mine. I stay open to the Spirit at work in these different activities.

When we first moved to Ireland six years ago I started taking poetry classes again to hone my own craft. That has been an exhilarating journey of deepening into my own poetic voice and finding a wonderful community here in Galway of support.

The poem above is inspired by St. Ita. She was one of the women saints and mystics of Ireland and she was a teacher and mentor to St. Brendan, one of the very well known monks of this land. Her feast day is January 15th. Ita had a dream about receiving three stones as a promise to her of what was to come. I loved entering into this moment as the inspiration for the poem that eventually emerged. While I write poems on a number of subjects, the poems I write inspired by particular monks and mystics feel like a doorway of connection to these saints beyond the veil. In writing them I want to connect ordinary people to the lives of these remarkable people and to make them somehow more accessible, to see how their lives and witness might offer guidance for our own.

So I encourage you to sit with the poem above. On our writing retreat we practice lectio divina with poetry, reading a particular poem out loud several times and listening for the word or phrase that shimmers, then letting that unfold in the imagination until we hear an invitation, and then rest into silence. I invite you to consider a version of this process and to see what a poem calls you to see and hear in new ways.

For me, the divine voice speaks so often through the gift of poetry. Poems slow us down, invite us to pause and linger, to repeat words so we can savor them and let them infuse into our very being. They offer the world back to us in a new form, in a new way.

You can pre-order my first full collection of poems titled Dreaming of Stones being published by Paraclete Press and available in March!

If you want to cultivate your own poetry writing, please join me June 10-14, 2019 in Chartres, France for a time of retreat and pilgrimage, journeying the labyrinth, and exploring the sacred gifts of poetry in your own life.

With great and growing love,

Christine

 

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Dancing Monk icon of St Ita  © Marcy Hall at Rabbit Room Arts (prints are available in her Etsy shop)

Monk in the World Guest Post: Peter Nagle

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Peter Nagle's reflection on retiring to the edge.

My life partner Joy and I are from New Hampshire and Ct. We’ve been married 20 years coming up and worked together in our former business: A Private Financial Advisory Firm. It was a 38 year career for me. I always considered what I did a ministry. But both of us longed to find a quieter, more simple life. That opportunity presented itself 3 years ago when, out of nowhere, a larger company offered to buy us out. We took the offer and retired.

Finally we had our chance to live the quiet faithful lives we yearned for, and to live them on the edge.

Though we lived and worked in CT, we had had a home in Hawaii for the winters as well for 6 years. Hawaii (Oahu in our case) is an incredibly beautiful place. Warm, lush, green – I described it as a womb-like place. But we knew we couldn’t retire there. I know this sounds incredible but it’s just too beautiful, too separated from the rest of the world, and as such unchallenging. We needed to be someplace on the edge. Someplace spiritual that would challenge us to become who we were meant to be.

We found that place in Northern New Mexico. I was trained there to be a Spiritual Companion and also attended the Living School there. So we had occasion to come here often. It’s mountains and desert here. Starkly beautiful, with a huge horizon, and not a little danger. If you go out into the desert unprepared, you’re unlikely to come back. The desert is not forgiving. Scripture stories of Jesus going into the desert to pray bring to mind how purifying the desert is. It is definitely living on the edge here, and we love it.

We live like monks really, I’ve said that for years. The atmosphere in our home is soft, quiet, with beautiful sacred music. People always comment how calm and soothing it is in our home.

Joy is a certified yoga instructor and that is a big part of her belief system and life. She teaches Yoga weekly at Dancing in the Desert in El Rito and continues to study her craft very deeply. I am a Spiritual Companion and it is very meaningful to me, to help people sort out their spiritual lives. I have a private practice, and also do spiritual companionship for Richard Rohr’s Living School, as well as for Ghost Ranch.

Together we care for pilgrims that come our way, Joy with her yoga and healthy nutrition, and me with spiritual guidance, and of course, the land. We have a retreat house that is quiet, secluded, and with wonderful views and lovely hikes of all kinds. Our house faces the West and we witness the amazing sunsets nightly. Silence is a close companion here. The kind of silence that allows you to explore your inner depths to discover who you are and what God created you to be.

We also travel the West to witness its incredible beauty and people.

I want to say one other thing. In addition to the desert being on the edge, the people and life here are very much “on the ground”. People live close to the land here, the earth. Many people are poor and have little in the way of material possessions. It’s quite a contrast to Fairfield County CT where we lived for so long. But it feels so much more real here. People are real. They are kind and love to talk story.

We still keep an open mind for our place of resurrection. This may be it, who knows? We are listening for the call and are definitely hearing it now. In the meantime we continue our search, along the edge, with faith and love.

Peter Nagle’s life has been guided by deep faith and spirituality, and he loves to help people with their own spiritual path. Peter is certified as a Spiritual Companion and lives in Ojo Caliente NM with his wife Joy, a yoga instructor. He is a retired financial advisor. He holds a Masters in Religion from Yale Divinity School where he graduated cum laude in 1996. Peter is a Spiritual Companion for Richard Rohr’s Living School Students, and he graduated from that program in 2016. Peter is currently focusing on building his Spiritual Companion practice (also known as Spiritual Direction). He and his wife, Joy, have four daughters and four grandchildren. Visit him online at Soulwork.Faith

 

Feast of Epiphany – Follow the Star ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims,

The Feast of Epiphany is celebrated today. It is one of my favorite scripture stories as it offers us a series of powerful invitations.

The last few lines of the gospel text, offer us a template for an archetypal journey, that is, one we are all invited to make. We can find ourselves in the text if we have ever longed to follow an inkling into the long night knowing there were gifts awaiting us.

1. Follow the star to where it leads

The story begins with the magi calling upon the grace of night vision.  Navigation in ancient times was largely by stars and constellations. Travelers had to know the night sky and trust the path through darkness and unknowing. As you cross this threshold into the New Year, what is the star beckoning you in the night? As you stand under a black sky of unknowing which star is shimmering? The star might be a particular practice, which when you commit to following it, will guide you in a holy direction. It might be a word to guide you for the year.

2. Embark on the journey, however long or difficult

Herod gathers all his chief priests and scribes to find out more about this holy birth. Instead of searching out for himself, he sends the magi on his behalf. While Herod seeks outside advice and send others, the magi make the journey for themselves. Where are you tempted to trust others to make the journey for you, perhaps in reading books about the spiritual journey but never practicing yourself? How might you own your journey more deeply in the coming year?

3. Open yourself to wonder along the way

The scriptures tell us the magi were “overjoyed at seeing the star.” I like to imagine them practicing this kind of divine wonderment all along the journey there. Moments which spoke to the sacred call. When we lose our sense of wonder our hearts become hardened and cynical, we forget to believe in magical possibilities. As you enter into a new cycle of the earth’s turning, how might you embrace the gift of wonder? What practices open your heart.

4. Bow down at the holy encounters in messy places

When the magi enter the messy, earthy place of the manger, it says they bow down and prostrate themselves. Prostration is an act of humility and honor, as well as full-body connection with the earth. As you encounter the sacred in the most ordinary of places, how might you express this embodied appreciation and honor.

5. Carry your treasures and give them away freely

The magi reveal the gifts they have brought of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Gold represents the honor brought to a King, frankincense is a connection to the divine by raising our prayers heavenward, and myrrh a holy oil of anointing.  What are the treasures you carry with you into the New Year? How might you offer them even more generously to others in the months to come?

6. Listen to the wisdom of dreams

The magi are warned in a dream not to return to Herod and they listen to this night wisdom. The scriptures are filled with stories of dreams delivering important messages and facilitating discernment. Our own night dreams arrive unbidden laden with mystery and meaning. In the new year, how might you honor these stories which emerge from the darkness and surrender of sleep?

7. Go home by another way

After receiving the gift of the dream, they choose another way home. In truth, after any journey of significance, there is no going back the same way as before. We always return with new awareness if we have been paying attention.  What is the usual path you have traveled which has become suffocating? How this year call forth new directions in your own life? Is there something symbolic of the new way home which you could carry with you like a talisman?

These stories carry ancient treasures for us: guidance and wisdom along the way. Ultimately we turn inward to discover our own call, our own treasures to share, the dreams emerging in silent spaces.

I invite you to find a window of time in these next few days to ponder this story and these questions in your heart and see what insights they awaken for you.

Join us for our New Year online retreat The Soul’s Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred (starts tomorrow!)>>

With great and growing love,

CHRISTINE

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Photo © Christine Valters Paintner

Listen to Christine’s podcast interview on Awakened Woman Self-Care

In this podcast Christine explains why she chose the title The Soul’s Slow Ripening. It called to her because her approach, “… has always been organic and tied to the seasons. The contemplative approach to life is not a quick fix solution. It allows for the season to have its fullness.” Christine also speaks about her move to Ireland, a land rich in sacred history. She shares her stories of mystics and the magic of stones there.

Click here to listen >>

Monk in the World Guest Post: Susan Fish

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Susan Fish's reflection "Stilling the Whirlwind."

“I begin to understand why the saints were rarely married women,” wrote Anne Morrow Lindbergh in her classic book, A Gift from the Sea. “I am convinced it has nothing inherently to do, as I once supposed, with chastity or children. It has to do primarily with distractions. The bearing, rearing, feeding and educating of children; the running of a house with its thousand details; human relationships with their myriad pulls—woman's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life.”

This summer, just as Lindbergh temporarily left her usual life behind to go to the sea, so I left behind my normal occupations—as mother, wife, dog walker, chief cook and bottle-washer—for a very short time to lean toward creativity, contemplation and the saintly life.

I went to Italy. For two days.

The story behind that story involved found days during a business trip to Switzerland, shockingly cheap flights, and the mustering of a great deal of courage to travel on my own to a country whose language I don’t really speak.

Lindbergh speaks for me when she writes, “I cannot be a nun in the midst of family life. I would not want to be.” But for a whirlwind two days, yes, perhaps.

I booked a stay in a convent in Florence and my most important destination was to climb the many steps that lead to the 100-year-old San Miniato church in time to listen to the monks sing vespers.

Part of my purpose in this trip was to research a novel, partly set in Florence. I had been once before, and this time I wanted to go alone, to serve my creative project and my soul. I pictured myself moving fast and unencumbered through the streets, carrying only the lightest and most essential of possessions (a toothbrush, a passport and a change of underwear), deciding for myself where I would stop and where I would go.

Instead, I found myself in the midst of the state that Lindbergh calls “torn-to-pieces-hood,” surrounded and slowed by thousands upon thousands of tourists, anxious about getting lost, feeling the foreignness of a foreign city. Even the nuns seemed distracted, busy about many things.

I witnessed those who were centred: the monks who faithfully, daily, performed their offices in the crypt of the church on the hill. The coolness of the marble steps I sat upon and the listening to their voices, whose words I did not understand, but God did—those gave me an hour’s peace. And then I was out in the inner and outer chaos once more.

The last time I had been to Florence, it had been a warm, green, quiet March. Now the city was baked in the intense summer heat, swarming with mosquitos and tourists alike. Contemplation felt improbable, if not impossible, and I wondered how I would think about the trip, how I would write about it.

And then, everything shifted.

Catherine of Siena lived fifty miles and 650 years from today’s Florence.  Lindbergh quotes Catherine, saint and mystic, who says, “The cell of self-knowledge is the stall in which the pilgrim must be reborn.”

It was true for me too. When the city and the tourists became too much for me, that was when I became a monk in the world: I found a small stone doorstep and sat quietly, allowing the noise and the chaos of the world to go by. I let go of my literary agenda that said I needed to visit three museums, two shops, a church and a vertical garden during my 25 hours in the city. I released my disappointment that Florence had not been the magical experience I had remembered. I made myself at home within myself. As Lindbergh says, quoting another writer, I found “the stilling of the soul within the activities of the mind and body so that it might be still as the axis of a revolving wheel is still.”

As I had imagined, I had darted through the city, boldly, avidly, sucking the marrow out of the experience—a whirlwind on a whirlwind trip. But it was in that stilling of my soul, mind and body, even for a short while, that I was able to be present to God, to myself, to the world around me. I thought of another monk in the world, the prophet Elijah, who looked for and did not find God in the great whirlwind, in the powerful earthquake, or in the fire—only to truly find God in the still small voice that came afterwards.

Susan Fish is a writer and editor who lives in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada with her husband, three young adult children and one wild dog. She has finished the novel she was researching on her whirlwind trip to Florence. Visit her online at storywell.ca.

New Year Blessings ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Stop by this link to read W.S. Merwin’s poem “To the New Year”

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims,

I offer you a reprise of my reflection on Embracing Mystery in the New Year: Ten Essential Practices.

Let mystery have its place in you; do not be always turning up your whole soil with the plowshare of self-examination, but leave a little fallow corner in your heart ready for any seed the winds may bring, and reserve a nook of shadow for the passing bird; keep a place in your heart for the unexpected guests, an altar for an unknown God.

-Henri-Frederic Amiel

Who doesn't love the promise of new beginning the New Year offers? St. Benedict described his Rule as a Rule for beginners, reminding us to always begin again. In Buddhism, an essential practice is beginner's mind. When we think we have become an expert at things, especially the spiritual life, we are in trouble.

Living into the mystery of things helps us to release our hold on needing to know the answers. One of the things the monk and artist have in common is a love of mystery, a willingness to sit in the place of tension and paradox until it ripens forth.

New Year's resolutions often come from a place of lack, or of thinking we know how to "fix" ourselves. Unfortunately, they are often fueled by a consumer culture that is eager to have us buy more and more things to improve ourselves. Embracing mystery, on the other hand, honors our profound giftedness and depth and acknowledges that coming to know ourselves and God is a lifetime exploration.

So my invitation to you, dear monks and artists, is to shift your thinking this year. Welcome in ambiguity. Learn to love the holy darkness of mystery. Dance on the fertile edges of life.  Let what you love ripen forth.

Breathe deeply – our breath is our most immediate and vital connection to the life force which sustains us moment by moment. Let yourself be filled with awe and wonder at the marvels of this intimate gift.  Sit for three minutes savoring that you are breathed into.
Embrace night wisdom – one of the great gifts of dreams is that they upend our desire for logic and immerse us in a narrative which reveals the shadows we must wrestle with and the joys which call to us, whether or not they make sense to the waking world.
Dance freely– we live so disconnected from our bodies. Dance has been part of human culture for thousands of years as a way to experience union with ourselves, one another, and the divine. Each day put on one piece of music that you love, close the door, and dance. Pay attention to what rises up in the process. If you resist, even better – dance with your resistance!
Follow the thread– each of us has a unique unfolding story and call in this world. We don't "figure this out" but rather we allow the story to emerge in its own time, tending the symbols and synchronicities which guide us along.
Trust in what you love– following the thread is essentially about cultivating a deep trust in what you love. What are the things that make your heart beat loudly, no matter how at odds they feel with your current life (and perhaps especially so)? Make some room this year to honor what brings you alive.
Let the rhythms of nature guide you– we live our lives in a constant state of stimulation and productivity. We are often exhausted and overwhelmed. When we turn to the natural world we find with each day, each moon cycle, and each season a rhythm of rise and fall, fullness and emptiness. Trying to live all the time in rising or fullness is exhausting. Make some time to embrace the falling and emptiness of life which immerses us in an experience of mystery.
Release what is no longer necessary– we accumulate so many things in our days, perhaps you have discovered at Christmas that you have a new pile of stuff which now requires energy to maintain or worry about. Reflect on what is most essential. Then ask yourself, what are the thoughts, attitudes, or expectations about life which keep you from freedom?  How do you try to control the direction of your life rather the yielding to grace?
Remember that you will die– St. Benedict writes in his Rule to "keep death daily before your eyes." This is never an act of morbid obsession, but a reminder of life's incredible gift. Any of us who have brushed near death, or had loved ones pass away, know this wisdom in profound ways. This is another paradox of the spiritual life: a vibrant relationship to our mortality is essential to a vibrant relationship to life.
Ask for the wisdom of your ancestors– each of us is the inheritor of generations of stories which beat through our blood. Each of us has mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers, who wrestled mightily with living a meaningful life. We can call upon this great "cloud of witnesses" to support us in our own wrestling.  We can listen across the veil between worlds.
Open yourself to receiving a word for the year ahead– in quiet moments what are the desires you hear being whispered from your heart? Is there a word or phrase that shimmers forth, inviting you to dwell with it in the months ahead? Something you can grow into and don't fully understand?

Imagine if your New Year's wasn't about fixing or improving, but about deepening and transforming, about embracing the holy mystery at the heart of the world.

What if the year ahead wasn't about growing more certain about things, but about releasing the hold of your thinking mind so something deeper and more fertile could rise up?

What might bloom from such rich soil of your imagination?  How might you create an altar for an unknown God and for the unknown depths of your own beautiful being waiting to be freed?

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Photo © Christine Valters Paintner

Christmas Blessings from the Abbey ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims,

All of us here at the Abbey – John, Christine, and the Abbey Wisdom Council – wish you a most wondrous Christmas feast. This is the time for holy birthing to happen in unlikely places, a time to listen to what rises in the stillness, a time to trust in the darkness that seeds are sprouting deep beneath the fertile earth. We live in a world hungry for such truths. What a gift you each are to be a bearer of this wisdom.

To support this knowing in your own heart, I offer you a few links to holy pauses for beauty:

Christmas Sparrow (a poem by Billy Collins)

Christmas Poem (a poem by Mary Oliver)

How the Light Comes (a blessing for Christmas Day by Jan Richardson)

Lo How a Rose E’er Blooming (a beautiful performance of my favorite song of the season by Gesualdo Six)

Lo How a Rose E’er Blooming (a gorgeous arrangement of this song by J. Sandstrom in an even more contemplative rhythm)

Consider giving yourself the gift of several 5-minute pauses during the frenzy this time of year can bring. During each holy pause read one of the poems or blessings or listen to one of the pieces of music, place your hand on your heart, and remember what the season is really inviting you into. Remember that the incarnation teaches us that we too are holy and Christ takes up dwelling within each of us. All we need to do is pay attention.

For all of those for whom this time of year is especially challenging because of loneliness, family dysfunction, depression, or other struggles, I will be thinking of you in a special way this time of year and sending extra love.

May Christ be born in each of your hearts.

(We will be taking a break this coming week from the daily emails.)

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE

Photo © Christine Valters Paintner